The Attorney-General, George Brandis, has announced a program to combat terrorist propaganda on the internet, including real-time monitoring of social media, at a White House summit in Washington on countering violent extremism.

Senator Brandis also announced a follow-up security summit for regional nations to be held later this year.

The White House summit was called by US president Barack Obama to find strategies to prevent young Muslims from being radicalised online.

Australia was one of more than 80 countries and international organisations that gathered in Washington to come up with a plan for tackling the growing problem, as violent groups, including Islamic State, Boko Haram and al-Shabaab, gain strength in Africa and across the Middle East.

Senator Brandis said the Australian Government would contribute $18 million to an initiative combating terrorist propaganda online.

"Those measures will include real-time monitoring of social media," he said.

"They will include an active takedown of terrorist websites and terrorist postings, and also funding of civil society organisations to establish counter-narratives to combat and contest terrorist narratives that are being mediated online."

Senator Brandis said the real-time monitoring of social media was not cause for privacy concern, despite the current privacy debate over proposed metadata laws that would see Australia's internet companies required to retain customer information for two years for security agencies to access.

"It's not under any guise at all," he said.

"It is for a specific and important purpose, and that is to ensure that the internet is not used as a vehicle for the promotion of terrorist propaganda ... for terrorist recruitment, for the advocacy of terrorist crime."

Jihadist propaganda to be treated like child pornography

Senator Brandis said Australia would treat jihadist propaganda on the internet the same way it treats child pornography - monitoring social media sites and taking down offensive material.

"We are monitoring social media for the purpose of identifying and, where appropriate, taking down terrorist propaganda, just as we monitor social media for the purpose of identifying and taking down paedophilia, other organised criminal activity that is mediated through the media," he said.

"We must move beyond the notion some people still have that the internet, social media, are a lawless space.

"They are not and one of the learnings from this conference on countering violent extremism in Washington today is that social media, the internet, cyberspace, are one of the most sophisticated techniques and tools that ISIL and terrorist groups like ISIL take advantage of.

"In the words of one of the participants in the conference today, what ISIL has been able to do, with more sophistication than any terrorist group has ever done before, is to weaponise information, and the way in which weaponised information is used is through the internet."

Senator Brandis also announced Australia would host a security summit of regional nations later this year to follow up on initiatives raised at the White House conference.